Archive for December, 2006

Maybe you’ve heard about the recent earthquakes here in Taiwan. Well, we (me and my dad and brother, who are visiting me currently) weren’t anywhere near where the damage occured, so we’re fine, but our hotel room was certainly shaking that night. Quinn and my dad have been here since last Sunday, and we’ve done a lot since then. It’s been pretty stressful to work full time and have guests as well, but fortunately I got to take the last few days off so we could take a little trip down to Hualien and Taroko Gorge. Here are our past 2 weeks in pictures!

First we got the touristy stuff out of the way, like going to Chiang Kai-shek Memorial, Taipei 101,

and Taiwan Storyland. Taiwan Storyland is a recreation of 1965 Taipei. Here’s my dad in the classroom there, pretending he’s some kind of teacher or something.

Then they came to the kindergarten to hang out with my kids

and watch me teach.

On Christmas eve we went to Danshui

and then came home for a Christmas dinner of soup, fried rice, cookies, and rice wine.

I gave my brother a Xiao for Christmas

and he and my dad gave me an Erhu, so we played some beautiful music together.

On Christmas we headed down to Hualien and Taroko Gorge. I think these pictures speak for themselves:

My dad and brother are here and I keep trying to find a moment to write an entry about everything we’ve been up to. We’re off to Hualien tomorrow, though, and I still haven’t found that moment so I guess I’ll just have to do a massive post when we get back. For now, you can always check out my pictures.

As of Friday I have been in Taiwan for three months. That’s 1/4 of the time I’m committed to, can you believe it?

The biggest change for me recently is that I finally got up the nerve to drive my scooter out of Luzhou. A whole new world has opened up to me! I can zip over the river into Taipei, or head in the other direction to check out that park that was always just out of reach. I have nothing bad to say about the public transportation I had been using up until now, but it’s great to be a little more independent. Also, I’m not sure exactly how big my gas tank is, but it only takes about 4 bucks to fill it up!

It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas around here. Well, maybe not Christmas in Minnesota since the weather here is still in the 60’s, but I drove into Taipei to do some Christmas shopping this weekend and bought a little tree and some decorations. We’ve been decorating the kindergarten like crazy too, as well as preparing the kids for the annual Christmas program.

I’m really looking forward to Christmas, as nontraditional as it will be. My dad and brother are coming over and we’ll be heading down to Hualien and Taroko Gorge for a few days. We may not be making snow angels, but how’s this for a winter wonderland?